Florida, Oddly Enough

Walter at the door, by Jo March. This is part of a story inspired by the image.

It was getting late. The light in the house was casting shadows that signaled dinnertime.  The air outside contained the scents of winter rot. Coldness, damp, cracked nutshells, and watery foliage becoming earth.  Walter moved from the blanket pile and crossed the kitchen floor. He stretched and yawned. When the man comes back he will smell of smoke and machines and sweat and sadness. He will get a fire going and cook. Walter will be fed, then he will go outside and circle the house, smelling the trails of the other creatures who have crossed the yard in the daylight hours since the man left the house. 

Once a woman had shared this house with Walter and the man. She was home in the daylight, and would scratch Walter's backend and behind his ears. She would cook the food while the sun came in the south windows, and Walter would be given a bone if she cooked meat. He liked the woman, who sang while she cooked and had soft light in her eyes when she looked at Walter.  Walter loved being home with the woman. 

Sometimes they played find the rag, a game that started one day when the woman hung his blankets on the fence to absorb the smells of summer sun. When she brought them in to remake his bed, her wiping rag had come off her belt as she folded and arranged his bed. She began walking around the house looking for it. Walter watched her, and followed her when she went back outside to search along the fence. When they came back inside Walter went to his bed and smelled the cloth in between his blankets. He pulled it out and carried it in his teeth to the woman, who laughed and shook it out. This made Walter want to play and he lowered his torso to the ground and made a soft woof. She threw the rag and Walter caught it. Afterward, she would sometimes take a wiping rag and place it in the chair cushion, or under the bed, or in her sewing basket, and ask Walter to find her rag. And he always did. Then she'd scratch his ears and backside, and shine her soft lit eyes into his. He loved the woman and the man. 

The woman began to have a tired smell, and laid in the bed most of the days. Walter stayed beside her until the man came home. The man would get the fire going, cook, and sit and talk with the woman until the day was done. The woman left with the man one day. A truck took them away and only the man came back, smelling sad.

The man still smells sad when he arrives home. Walter puts his paw on the man's foot while they sit in front of the fire in the evening, and he watches the man's face, looking for a look that might mean the woman is coming back.  The man sighs and Walter sighs. It is dark now.

~Dorothy Dolores